What if I gain weight over the holidays?
My mission today is to help you manage your thoughts around this topic so we do 2 things: prevent extreme changes in weight and how to accept the small fluctuations… because sister, it is normal this time of year.
For any of you wanting to solidify your empowered eating journey, Food Foundations is my signature program where I teach you how to feel strong and confident in your body without obsessing over food or wasting time on another failed diet. This is the real deal where you learn empowered eating. And I have a little surprise for all of you Food Foundations students…
I am adding a special something that ONLY YOU have access to as a Food Foundations student. Something that has been on my heart to serve and support you all in a greater capacity. So, any of you who are currently enrolled be sure to check your email from me this week! The details and updates will be sent directly to you or you can go on into the Food Foundations platform and details will be in the welcome and congrats models. Eeeek! So excited to see you all there.
All right, all right… let’s get ready for this one today. We are talking about the one thing most people fear over the holidays… weight gain. While this is a challenging topic, I am here with you to face it head-on so it doesn’t steal your joy this year… who else is in?
Today, I have two key points for you. I want to invite you to take these two tips into the holidays so you can grow in your own empowered eating journey.
#1 Stand assured and confident in the top 3 healthy habits you have committed to maintaining.
On Halloween I dropped an episode called “Do you swing from restoration to overeating? What to do differently this holiday season” and here I invited you to commit to your top 3 healthiest, best habits. The intention here is to give us confidence in what we ARE DOING.
This is our commitment to ourselves, this is our date with ourselves, and ultimately this is where we solidify the hard work we have done all year. This is the discipline side. I want to remind you of your top three and invite you to stay strong and committed to those throughout the month of December. For me that is my workout routine, mindfully eating desserts, and making one of my 3 meals a veggie-based meal.
#2 Accept fluctuation— normal fluctuations are anywhere from 1-7# in a day.
When weight changes overnight, it isn’t necessarily reflective of a consistent change rather it is more likely you are capturing a fluctuation based on your environment. Your body isn’t the problem here, rather it is simply a shift because of circumstance.
I would expect a change after any thanksgiving day, traveling, a late night, drinking alcohol, or having a larger meal before bed (say at a holiday party). Where we can start to weave in trusting our body is by giving ourselves space for this fluctuation WHILE returning to tip #1, and maintaining our top 3.
This is how we avoid the all-or-nothing mentality! Nobody gains weight because they had one larger meal at thanksgiving. Sure, you may feel puffy or bloated, but your body didn’t flip a switch and decide to stop metabolizing food and hold on to every bite. This is not what causes holiday weight gain.
What causes holiday weight gain is when we get to that next morning and feel icky… and decide to either hop on the restrict-then-overeat merry-go-round or decide it is the holidays so we may as well throw in the towel and we can “get back to it in the New Year.”
Can you hear the all-or-nothing lens on those responses?
To build trust in our body we will need to give it a bit of grace (that is accepting the fluctuations) while continuing to care for it (and in this case that is staying committed to your top 3). This is the balance of discipline with sprinkles of flexibility. I am wishing that for all of you as we go into Thanksgiving week and the last month of the year. I am praying for you to find more peace and body gratitude this week than you ever have before.
Cheers my sweet friends, and happy holiday eating!
